✦ CHAPTER FOUR
Ash and Moonlight
Training began at dawn.
If dawn existed in a place where the sky was only swirling mist and drifting soul-light.
Eryndor stood at the edge of the arena, heart hammering. Trainee Reapers thundered across the black stone, spectral scythes forming and dissolving as they moved. Shadows bent around them, obeying their will.
Seris stood beside him, arms crossed.
"Lesson one," they said. "The scythe is not summoned with strength—"
A trainee lunged, and his scythe rippled like liquid darkness, slicing through a dummy. It split cleanly, not in flesh — but in spirit. A ghostly outline of the dummy drifted into the air before dissolving.
"—it is summoned with acceptance."
Eryndor swallowed. "Acceptance of what?"
"That you are death."
He flinched. "I don't want to be."
"That is irrelevant."
Seris faced him fully. "Summon your scythe."
Eryndor looked down at his marked palm. The sigil pulsed, like a second heartbeat.
He closed his eyes and tried to feel the same instinct he felt in the storm — the fear, the urgency, the shadows coming for him.
Nothing.
Seris's voice stayed calm. "You are thinking. Thinking is for mortals."
"I am mortal."
"For now."
Eryndor grit his teeth and tried again.
He reached into the part of him that felt jagged and broken since that night. The place where the dying knight's soul had touched him.
The mark stirred.
Shadows twined up his arm.
Almost.
A sharp pain cracked across his ribs — a blunt force knocking the air from his lungs.
He hit the ground, breathless.
He looked up, stunned. Seris stood over him, holding a training staff made of condensed shadow.
"What—?!"
"You were too slow."
"You attacked me!"
"Yes. And you should have reacted."
Eryndor scrambled to his feet. "You could warn me!"
Seris's expression didn't change. "Death does not warn."
They struck again — faster.
Eryndor blocked clumsily with his forearm; pain exploded down to his wrist.
He swung wildly, but Seris caught him with effortless grace and sent him sprawling a second time.
A few trainees paused to watch.
"He can't even summon a weapon," one murmured.
"He doesn't belong here," another whispered.
Heat rose in Eryndor's chest — anger mixing with humiliation.
Seris's tone remained neutral. "Again."
Eryndor pushed himself up. He wanted to scream. He wanted to run. He wanted to be anywhere except a citadel of the dead, with a mark he couldn't escape and a destiny he never wanted.
Something inside him snapped.
Not with despair.
With defiance.
"I don't accept being death," he growled. "But I will not be hunted by it."
The mark flared.
Dark fire tore through his palm — not cold this time, but alive.
The air trembled.
A scythe erupted from shadows — taller than him, the blade shimmering like a crescent moon caught in a storm. It hummed, as though recognizing him.
The air itself seemed to recoil.
Seris's eyes widened.
Good.
Eryndor swung.
Seris parried — but barely — the impact sending a shockwave across the arena. Trainees stumbled; the violet torches flickered.
Seris's voice was low. "There it is. Raw. Unfocused. Dangerous."
Eryndor held the scythe with both hands, breath heaving. "I don't want this power."
"Power is rarely given to those who want it."
Shadows swirled at Seris's feet.
They vanished — reappearing behind him — and swept Eryndor's legs from under him in a blur.
He hit the ground hard.
The scythe flickered and dissolved.
Pain radiated through his shoulder. He lay there, panting, as Seris offered no hand, no pity.
"Lesson two," Seris murmured. "Power without control is death. Your death."
Eryndor closed his eyes.
I'm not cut out for this.
A whisper slithered through his mind.
You do not belong to them.
Eryndor's pulse stopped.
The voice wasn't Seris's.
It echoed from somewhere beneath the arena floor — deep, ancient, patient.
He sat up slowly.
"…Did you hear that?"
Seris frowned. "Hear what?"
The voice returned — stronger.
I am still waiting.
Eryndor went cold. "There's something here. Under us."
Seris's expression shifted — not anger this time, but a flicker of fear.
"There is nothing beneath the arena."
"That's a lie."
Seris grabbed his arm, grip iron-tight. "Do not listen."
The voice coiled like smoke.
Every Reaper here is bound by chains.
You are not.
Eryndor's breath shook. "It spoke to me before. On the bridge."
Seris's voice dropped to a whisper sharp enough to cut.
"Eryndor. Look at me."
He did.
"If the chained soul has chosen you," they said, "then your greatest danger is not the High Reaper. It is yourself."
Something cracked beneath the arena — stone splitting from within.
Seris pushed him back. "Training is over."
That night, Eryndor could not sleep.
He wandered the corridor outside the trainee dorms, unable to stop thinking about the voice. The laws of the Veil repeated in his mind, Kaelith's voice echoing.
A soul with chains must never be touched.
Eryndor reached a balcony overlooking the soul-river far below. The current of pale lights moved lazily, millions of souls drifting like stars in dark water.
He traced the mark on his palm.
"Why me?" he whispered.
A chill wind brushed his ear — not wind at all.
Because you are the only one who can break the chains.
Eryndor turned.
A shadow stood behind him — tall, formless, the edges flickering like torn cloth. Not a Wraithborn. Something older. Its eyes were hollow fire.
Eryndor stepped back, throat tight. "Who are you?"
Chains materialized around the figure — spectral, glowing, wrapped around its limbs and throat.
I am what the Reapers fear.
One chain snapped.
The sound echoed through the Citadel.
And you… are my key.
Eryndor whispered the only words he could find.
"…Gods help me."
The chained soul smiled.
They won't.